For the past two decades, educators in the United States have looked to Finland as a model of academic success. Strong scores on the inaugural Program for International Student Assessment, released in 2001, prompted a wave of interest and a familiar question: What are they doing right? In response, we have catalogued structural features including less standardized testing, shorter school days, and highly trained teachers who in turn are given greater autonomy.
But after visiting schools and day-care centers in Helsinki, speaking with teachers and students, and observing classrooms firsthand, I came away with a revised impression. While these structural features matter, they may not be the most important driver of student success. Instead, what stood out most was something that often receives less attention: the way Finland approaches early-childhood learning.
The curricula and philosophies of day-care centers in Finland, which serve children from ages 1 through 6, focus almost entirely on what educators in the United States call civics education or social-emotional learning for early childhood.
From as early as age 1, children are explicitly taught how to function as members of a community. In a neighborhood day-care center, I watched 2-year-olds independently climb into and fasten their own snowsuits before going outside. Nearby, 5-year-olds guided younger children through cleaning up after lunch so the space would be ready for the next group. These routines were not directed by adults in the moment. The routines had been taught, practiced, and internalized. Independence was treated not as a developmental bonus but an expectation.
Conflict, too, was treated differently. When a group of 4-year-olds began arguing over a game, a teacher intervened, not to stop the disagreement but to explore it. She asked each child to explain what had happened, then prompted them to describe how they felt and to listen to each other. She even invited slightly older children who were playing nearby to help mediate a solution. Over the course of nearly 20 minutes, the group collaboratively developed a set of rules for their game and recorded them so everyone could agree on what was fair.
Later, the teacher explained what she described as a central principle of their training: “Don’t let anything go.” Every conflict or moment of tension is treated as an opportunity to teach resolution, empathy, and decisionmaking. The goal is not efficiency but understanding.
Learning also extends beyond the classroom walls. Day-care groups regularly walk through their neighborhoods to visit parks, shops, libraries, and public institutions. Along the way, children learn how to navigate their environment: how to cross streets safely, how public transit works, and how different members of the community contribute to daily life. In Helsinki’s central library, children can experiment with instruments, tools, and technologies, reinforcing both curiosity and a broader understanding of shared resources and sustainability.
Even understanding the political role of citizens begins early. Young children visit government buildings and interactive exhibits where they learn about representation, cooperation, and decisionmaking. In one instance, I observed members of Parliament spontaneously stopping to speak with a group of visiting children, reinforcing the idea that governance is accessible and participatory. These experiences are not isolated enrichment activities. They are the curriculum.
When I later visited elementary and secondary classrooms, the instructional practices were, in many ways, familiar. Students worked in groups, teachers modeled skills, and independent practice followed. The structure of the lessons was not novel, but the dispositions of the students were.
Years of explicit instruction in independence, empathy, and community responsibility appeared to shape how students approached learning.
In a secondary mathematics class, students received a returned test and began reviewing their grades and feedback. I listened for the kinds of conversations that are common in many U.S. classrooms like comparisons of scores or competition over performance, but I heard none. When I asked a student whether classmates ever competed over grades, she seemed puzzled. “Like who came in first place on the test?” she asked, giggling. “No.”
In another class, students worked from different leveled materials based on their needs. Curious about the social dynamics this might create, I asked a student whether it ever led to teasing or stigma. He appeared genuinely confused by the question. “We all get what we need,” he explained.
That response echoed what I had seen earlier in day-care centers. Years of explicit instruction in independence, empathy, and community responsibility appeared to shape how students approached learning. They did not view it as a competition but as a process of meeting individual needs within a shared environment.
This perspective also seemed to extend to larger educational choices. After lower-secondary school, Finnish students choose between academic and vocational pathways. These options are treated as equally valid, with no sense of hierarchy or finality. Approximately half the students choose the vocational route, where pathways to higher education and well-paying jobs remain open, and students move forward based on their interests and goals. Again, the emphasis is not on comparison but on fit.
None of this is to suggest that Finland’s success can be reduced to a single factor. Its broader social policies and educational structures clearly play an important role. But what may be overlooked in many attempts to replicate the system is the extent to which early-childhood education lays a foundation for everything that follows.
Before Finnish students are asked to perform academically in primary school at age 7, they are taught how to be members of a community. They learn how to take responsibility for themselves and their environment, how to resolve conflicts, how to make decisions collaboratively, and how to navigate the world around them. By the time formal academic expectations increase, these habits and perspectives are already in place.
In the United States, civic education and even social-emotional learning in the early years is often minimized in favor of literacy and numeracy. But if the Finnish example suggests anything, it is that these domains are not in competition. The ability to engage productively in a learning environment, to persist, to collaborate, and to take ownership may depend in part on experiences that look less academic.
As educators continue to look abroad for models of improvement, it may be worth reconsidering not just how Finland structures its schools but what it chooses to teach before establishing academic rigor.
